Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

Archives for August 24, 2005

On Politics (Part 3)

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This follows my earlier two postings ‘on politics’ including the proposition that the left think the right are evil:

“The truth is not as simple as the question are people good or bad, as we so often put it. It is not as easy as Hobbes or Rousseau, because Hobbes and Rousseau are both wrong about the essential, inescapable fact of human nature.

Namely, that humans are animals, pure and simple. We are not good. We are not evil. We are not angels or demons. As much as we may try to deny it, we are very much a part of this world.

We are the product of evolution, and evolution bequeathed to us a system that is damnably hard to improve upon. If we find the world today is not to our liking, perhaps it would do us well to examine those cultural systems that evolution gave us, that worked for us so well for millions of years.

I refuse to believe that striking bit of irrationality that of all the animals in the world, humans are unique twice–the only fallen animal, and the most exalted one. Our mythology talks of “the fall,” and makes us the worst of all animals. Or we can focus on our superior soul or intellect, and laud ourselves as the best. Neither is true, but those myths serve a purpose.”

… from a blog here http://anthropik.com/2005/04/the-state-of-nature/
by Jason Godesky and titled ‘The State of Nature”.

Drinking Sewage – Request for More Information

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Toowomba is Ausralia’s largest inland regional city situated at the headwaters of the Murray Darling Basin. The population in the ‘Greater Toowoomba Region’ is 135,000 and expected to grow.

The Mayor of the city has committed to an ambitious waste water recycling program.

Some local irrigators are up-in-arms because they have been using the waste water to water their lucerne and other crops for about 60 years – and are going to lose access to this water.

Some local citizens are up-in-arms because they are being expected to drink “sewage” see, http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200508/s1443814.htm .

I am probably going to write this story up at some point in time and would be interested in information about other regional cities that are moving to recycle waste water – what it is costing, what it is delivering in terms of the social, economic and environmental impact and benefit?

More on Jared Diamond & ‘Collapse’

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“The fundamental flaw in Jared Diamond’s treatment of Easter Island is that he approaches the problems of its evolution and history with the zeal of an environmental campaigner, and not with the dispassionate detachment of a scientist. He is too much inclined to employ his historical reconstructions as a tool for the environmental agenda and subordinates much of his analysis to moralistic and preconceived intentions. ‘Collapse’ is perhaps the prime upshot of the amalgamation of environmental determinism and cultural pessimism in the social sciences.

“It epitomises a new and burgeoning doctrine expounded largely by
disillusioned left-wingers and former Marxist intellectuals. In place of the old creed of class warfare and socio-economic driving forces that used to explain every single development under the sun, environmental determinism essentially applies the same one-sided rigidity to historical events and societal evolution.”

…according to Benny Peiser in a piece titled ‘From Genocide to Ecocide: The Rape of Rapa Nui’ in Energy & Environment, 16:3&4 (2005), pp. 513-539. Read the complete paper here:

http://www.staff.livjm.ac.uk/spsbpeis/EE%2016-34_Peiser.pdf .

And Roger Kalla has emailed me with a link to a multimedia exhibition based on Diamond’s book and commented that in a recent issue of Nature (vol :436 p778) under books and arts the exhibition is given a positive review by Philip Campbell who is the editor-in-chief of this respected Journal.

The link to the exhibition:
http://www.nhm.org/exhibitions/collapse